on in. Your father is waiting for you. He’s been talking about having dinner with you three all afternoon.”
The three of us exchanged a look.
“Really?” I asked.
“Oh yes.” Tiff nodded. “He’s very excited. I’m not looking forward to tomorrow morning when he’s in a foul mood because his tummy hurts from all the rich food, but it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make. We haven’t seen Mr. Stenley in such high spirits in a couple of weeks. It’s nice.”
Katie leaned over and popped open the bag.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Hang on.” Katie pinched her tongue between her teeth as she went to the tips of her toes and peered into the bag, searching for something. She let out a victorious cry when she found it and pulled out a little black container with a clear lid. I spied a piece of chocolate cake with a strawberry on top through the lid before she handed it to Tiff. “We brought you something too, Tiff. As a thank you.”
Tiff’s eyes widened with surprise. “Oh, that was so sweet of you. Thank you. How did you know chocolate was my favorite?”
Katie winked. “I have a sixth sense about those kinds of things.”
Tiff ushered us away. “Hurry along now. Go see your father so I can dig into this cake. I don’t want any of the other nurses to see. I’m not the sharing type when it comes to my desserts.”
Chuckling, the three of us went down the hall to my father’s room. His door was open and we found him standing on shaking legs in front of the full-length mirror beside his bed.
He was putting on a tie.
“Hey, Dad,” I said, closing the door behind us with my hip. “We come bearing dinner. Mike almost ate it in the car but Katie fended him off.”
My father turned to us. He’d dressed in his good slacks, a plaid shirt, and a navy-blue tie I didn’t even know he owned. I wondered if he’d stolen it from one of the other residents. Theft was an issue in places like this. With everyone being so forgetful, they had a tendency to walk into a room, think everything was theirs, and take whatever suited their fancy.
When my father first moved in, the woman next to him had stolen his dentures.
Tiff had hardly been able to contain her laughter when she called to tell me about it. At the time, I’d been too blind with grief and pain to see the humor in it all. But now it was kind of funny.
“You look very handsome, Mr. Stenley,” Katie said as she pulled out chairs around the table in front of his bookcases.
My father took a seat and we began unpacking the bags. He watched every move I made as I popped the lids off the containers. Katie had packed plastic plates from the dollar store in her purse. She took them out, set everyone’s place setting, and began serving everyone their food.
It hit me in that moment how good of a mother she would make one day.
I watched her work while my brother took his seat.
“All right,” Katie said. “We have tenderloins, mashed potatoes, and peppercorn sauce.”
“Peppercorn?” my father cried delightedly. He clapped his hands together and rubbed them vigorously. “It’s a feast!”
Katie laughed. “It absolutely is. And I have one more thing.” She withdrew the bottle of red wine from one of the bags, along with the wine glasses, and held it out to him like she was a server at a high-end restaurant. She launched into all the details about the wine she’d selected, and my father nodded along like he found everything she was saying very informative. “Can I pour you a bit to taste?”
My father nodded eagerly.
Katie poured a splash of wine into his glass.
My father, who had never been a very sophisticated man, picked up the glass and swirled it like he was at a winery and had paid for a wine-tasting tour. He took a sip, smacked his tongue against the roof of his mouth, and nodded agreeably. “It’s delicious. Just delicious. Fill me up, Katie.”
She grinned and obliged, and before I knew it, I was sitting down to a family dinner with my father—my actual father, who had his full mind for the first time in ages—my little brother, and the girl I was discovering I just might marry one day.
It didn’t get any better than this. Mike laughed at our father’s jokes, which he’d never found all that funny